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Description
This is one of the many, many things on my to-do list, an aging chart specifically for my big boy Kwanza (on top of just revisiting his lore since I wrote pretty much jack shit on his original ref).

I've meant to do this for a while because the way he ages is very peculiar: instead of dulling or slightly greying out, his mane is slowly overtaken by white as years go by, until it's completely whited out; I've been wanting to commit this to "paper" for a looooong while, since it's an HC I've had for months and is very important to the way his character is remembered by the future generations.

As you may know (or more likely not, I haven't drawn this guy in what, two years?) Kwanza is the first king of the Pridelands, and I based him on a cave painting only visible in a location-restricted TLG mobile game (the bottom of the mane cloud can still be seen in the show, tough). What I decided is that the depiction is of him in his golden age, looking over the pridelands with his candid white mane blending into the clouds, sometimes even being confused with a mythical figure (the "great spirit"), because of how long ago he lived, and how important he is to the history of the land, he's pretty much been elevated to a godly status.

In life Kwanza began life like any other young lion in his generation, in a pride led by his father; however unlike most males his father didn't win the leadership in combat, instead he inherited it from his own father. Kwanza's grandfather came from a place called the Tree of life, where lions followed the teaching of this "great spirit", and a bunch of young males were sent out to win over prides and convert them to follow the "circle of life"; most didn't last long in the harsh world, and even when they managed to win over a pride their preachings were snubbed or subtly ignored. This was the case for the grandfather as well, but unlike most he managed to hold his nefound pride and even pass it down to his son, who while gratful for not being chased out or having to fight for the title of leader, was a bit more jaded towards the Great spirit's teachings.
Kwanza grew up listening to his grandfather's teachings, having no reason to doubt them since they seemed to be going well for his family... until another male came and took over, killing all the adult males and chasing a barely-out-of-his-teens Kwanza out. He becomes jaded, thinking that his father and grandfather just got lucky, and their stories were just that- stories to help cubs sleep happy at night; he lives as a rogue for a while, growing into a strong young adult, and then finds a pride to try and take over. And yet... he can't bring himself to do it, the leader isn't even that strong, but watching his cubs cowering from the sidelines as they fight, thinking how he's "expected" to kill them... it distracts him enough that he looses the fight.
For months he is lost, feeling like he doesn't have a purpose in life anymore, until he wanders into another pride's territory right as another older, bigger, stronger and more brutish rogue is in the process of taking over; he has already killed the previous leader and has started moving onto the younger cubs, a few tiny bodies already laying on the ground. Kwanza is almost about to leave as he can't stomach the sight anymore when a lioness about his age attacks the male in an attempt to protect her siblings, and is of course attacked as well; despite his better judgement he jumps in to help her, between the two of them they manage to make an opening for the three remaining cubs to run, then they follow suit.
The small group runs until they are well clear of the territory before finally stopping to catch their breath and talk things out, the lioness presents herself as Shetani, she's quite perplexed as to why he helped them, but thanks him none the less; they ultimately decide to stick together. This marks a turning point in Kwanza's life, he remembers about those tales of the circle of life and decides that he wants to find a place for his newfound little pride to live in peacefully, create a kingdom where the animals would live together in balance without fearing injustices such as these. It's not easy to find such place however, as many favorable territories already have established prides, clans or packs of different predators in them; eventually the little group reaches a loush territory with a big rock formation, a pride lives there already, but they're surprised to find them leader-less and low in numbers.
Kwanza goes on to establish himself as "king", calling audience with other animals and explaining his ideas (no killing for sport, the waterhole is a safe/neutral zone), the erbivores like it, the predators are skittish until they're reassured that they are also included in the "no killing for sport, only for food or in extreme selfe defense" meaning they wouldn't have to fear their young being killed by rival predators anymore or get deliberatley trampled by the herds.
He also decides to only take a single mate to be his queen, so that he can have an undeniable true heir to train and pass the leadership on, yadda yadda the rest is hystory and any more refined rules and tradition (regarding rogues and such) come later with time and experience.
He dies peacefully in his sleep after watching his grandchildren grow up in the kingdom he created, knowing many are also following suit.

.... Well that was more than I expected to write. you know me I get logorroic when writing HCs, and this guy needed it. I want to smush my face in his mane <3

TLK by disney
art and character by me, do not copy, trace, repost, reuse ecc without my permission please.

Description
This is one of the many, many things on my to-do list, an aging chart specifically for my big boy Kwanza (on top of just revisiting his lore since I wrote pretty much jack shit on his original ref).

I've meant to do this for a while because the way he ages is very peculiar: instead of dulling or slightly greying out, his mane is slowly overtaken by white as years go by, until it's completely whited out; I've been wanting to commit this to "paper" for a looooong while, since it's an HC I've had for months and is very important to the way his character is remembered by the future generations.

As you may know (or more likely not, I haven't drawn this guy in what, two years?) Kwanza is the first king of the Pridelands, and I based him on a cave painting only visible in a location-restricted TLG mobile game (the bottom of the mane cloud can still be seen in the show, tough). What I decided is that the depiction is of him in his golden age, looking over the pridelands with his candid white mane blending into the clouds, sometimes even being confused with a mythical figure (the "great spirit"), because of how long ago he lived, and how important he is to the history of the land, he's pretty much been elevated to a godly status.

In life Kwanza began life like any other young lion in his generation, in a pride led by his father; however unlike most males his father didn't win the leadership in combat, instead he inherited it from his own father. Kwanza's grandfather came from a place called the Tree of life, where lions followed the teaching of this "great spirit", and a bunch of young males were sent out to win over prides and convert them to follow the "circle of life"; most didn't last long in the harsh world, and even when they managed to win over a pride their preachings were snubbed or subtly ignored. This was the case for the grandfather as well, but unlike most he managed to hold his nefound pride and even pass it down to his son, who while gratful for not being chased out or having to fight for the title of leader, was a bit more jaded towards the Great spirit's teachings.
Kwanza grew up listening to his grandfather's teachings, having no reason to doubt them since they seemed to be going well for his family... until another male came and took over, killing all the adult males and chasing a barely-out-of-his-teens Kwanza out. He becomes jaded, thinking that his father and grandfather just got lucky, and their stories were just that- stories to help cubs sleep happy at night; he lives as a rogue for a while, growing into a strong young adult, and then finds a pride to try and take over. And yet... he can't bring himself to do it, the leader isn't even that strong, but watching his cubs cowering from the sidelines as they fight, thinking how he's "expected" to kill them... it distracts him enough that he looses the fight.
For months he is lost, feeling like he doesn't have a purpose in life anymore, until he wanders into another pride's territory right as another older, bigger, stronger and more brutish rogue is in the process of taking over; he has already killed the previous leader and has started moving onto the younger cubs, a few tiny bodies already laying on the ground. Kwanza is almost about to leave as he can't stomach the sight anymore when a lioness about his age attacks the male in an attempt to protect her siblings, and is of course attacked as well; despite his better judgement he jumps in to help her, between the two of them they manage to make an opening for the three remaining cubs to run, then they follow suit.
The small group runs until they are well clear of the territory before finally stopping to catch their breath and talk things out, the lioness presents herself as Shetani, she's quite perplexed as to why he helped them, but thanks him none the less; they ultimately decide to stick together. This marks a turning point in Kwanza's life, he remembers about those tales of the circle of life and decides that he wants to find a place for his newfound little pride to live in peacefully, create a kingdom where the animals would live together in balance without fearing injustices such as these. It's not easy to find such place however, as many favorable territories already have established prides, clans or packs of different predators in them; eventually the little group reaches a loush territory with a big rock formation, a pride lives there already, but they're surprised to find them leader-less and low in numbers.
Kwanza goes on to establish himself as "king", calling audience with other animals and explaining his ideas (no killing for sport, the waterhole is a safe/neutral zone), the erbivores like it, the predators are skittish until they're reassured that they are also included in the "no killing for sport, only for food or in extreme selfe defense" meaning they wouldn't have to fear their young being killed by rival predators anymore or get deliberatley trampled by the herds.
He also decides to only take a single mate to be his queen, so that he can have an undeniable true heir to train and pass the leadership on, yadda yadda the rest is hystory and any more refined rules and tradition (regarding rogues and such) come later with time and experience.
He dies peacefully in his sleep after watching his grandchildren grow up in the kingdom he created, knowing many are also following suit.

.... Well that was more than I expected to write. you know me I get logorroic when writing HCs, and this guy needed it. I want to smush my face in his mane <3

TLK by disney
art and character by me, do not copy, trace, repost, reuse ecc without my permission please.